


Chocolate and Deductions

by wendymarlowe



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fluff, Parent!lock, post-s4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-20
Updated: 2017-02-20
Packaged: 2018-09-25 21:25:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9845633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wendymarlowe/pseuds/wendymarlowe
Summary: Rosie has Sherlock wrapped around her little finger.





	

John didn’t close his laptop, but he did raise one eyebrow when Sherlock and Rosie came clattering back up the stairs to 221B. “Where’ve you two been?”

Rosie grinned at him. She had chocolate smeared on her cheek and a spot of it on the front of her dress. “Dada out!” she announced.

“We took a stroll around the park,” Sherlock sniffed, as haughty as he was able to while still in his dressing gown and ancient pajamas. “Rosie requested-”

“Wait, let me deduce this.” Despite having gone to bloody _Buckingham Palace_ in nothing but a sheet, Sherlock normally wouldn’t be caught dead looking anything less than perfect in public. And yet. _Dressing gown, pajamas, and scarf._ Definitely Rosie’s doing. “I’ll say . . . you were lying on the sofa faffing about in your mind palace.”

Sherlock made an affronted face. “Not while you’ve entrusted your daughter into my care, John, obviously. I was merely mulling over some things.”

“Oh, _obviously._ ” John had caught the man sound asleep on the living room floor once, Rosie attempting to build a careful tower of blocks on his bony chest, but Sherlock insisted he’d been conscious and ready to intervene if there had been a need. Given Sherlock’s near-supernatural awareness of his surroundings even when asleep, that might have even been true. “You were lying about in your jim-jams, then, and Rosie wanted to go outside. She woke you up-”

“-I wasn’t asleep-”

 _“Woke you up_ by dumping your scarf on your face and demanding to go out.”

Sherlock opened his mouth, no doubt to protest, but closed it again and nodded tightly.

“She was already dressed, because Mrs. Hudson brought up that new outfit for her this morning and would have insisted on seeing if it would fit and none of you thought to take it off before Rosie got something on it. Rosie-love, were you a big girl for Sherlock today?”

Rosie responded by wrapping Sherlock’s left leg in a slightly chocolatey hug.

“Did I get anything wrong?”

Sherlock grimaced. “I did have to retrieve our shoes,” he grumbled. “Knew you wouldn’t approve of me taking her out barefoot.”

“Very astute of you.” John had to bite back the instinct to jump up and go press a kiss into Sherlock’s tousled hair, height differences and “I’m not gay” be damned. It was ridiculously adorable how thoroughly Rosie had Sherlock wrapped around her tiny finger. “From the fact that Mrs. Hudson had to let you in, though, I _deduce_ that you left your wallet, keys, and phone here at the flat. Which means the chocolate Rosie just smeared all over your leg must have been from the newsstand on the corner, because you didn’t have money with you to buy her any but Alejandro owed you a favor and was willing to sneak her something for free. Oh!” The hint of a guilty look flashed over Sherlock’s face, making John revise his conclusion. “He was willing to sneak _you_ something for free, which you shared with her. You’re not going to eat your supper now, are you?”

Sherlock narrowed his eyes at him. “It was a Toblerone, and its consumption has no effect on whether Rosie and I have appetites afterward.”

“Of course not.” Sherlock’s willingness to eat meals at socially-appropriate times had increased dramatically once Mrs. Hudson pointed out that he was being a bad example for Rosie. Still, though, he tended to merely pick at anything that smacked of nutrition. Most of his calories came from peanut butter, sugared tea, and apple juice, nowadays. “I guess that means you’re going to eat the broccoli casserole Mrs. Hudson’s making us for dinner, right?”

“I’m . . .” Sherlock eyed Rosie, who looked back up at him adoringly. He finally threw his hands up in the air theatrically and groaned. “I’m outnumbered, I suppose.”

“Berk.”

“Facist.”

“Dada,” Rosie declared, not to be left out. “Dada Suh-wok _eat_.”


End file.
